


Christmas Just Ain't Christmas Without The Ones You Love

by asirenofbeauty



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Gen, Malia-centric, Malia/Pack feels, Pack Feels, Post-Season/Series 05
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-26
Updated: 2015-12-26
Packaged: 2018-05-09 10:05:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5535842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asirenofbeauty/pseuds/asirenofbeauty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Malia's not a fan of Christmas.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Christmas Just Ain't Christmas Without The Ones You Love

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the teenwolfrarepairsecretsanta exchange on tumblr! This was supposed to be more shippy than it actually turned out to be, but instead it's mostly Malia/Pack feels. Which, who doesn't love that?

Malia’s not a fan of Christmas. As a kid, she’s sure that there were plenty of years that she enjoyed it, between the excitement of waking up early on Christmas morning and running downstairs with her younger sister stumbling behind her, ripping open the wrapping paper from the presents, crying out in excitement over the gifts given to them both by their parents and then by Santa. It’s exciting for any kid that celebrates it, she thinks, but at some point, she started feeling disinterested in it. The excitement was still there, but she remembers she was only about eight or nine when she stopped believing in Santa Claus, and not long after was the accident involving her mom and sister. And after years of being a coyote, Christmas being truly nothing more than a day she didn’t even register on a mental calendar she didn’t have as an animal, the whole thing lost its meaning.

The first time she mentions it to the pack was when they were making plans for the Christmas after her transformation back to a human. Kira had turned to her, eyes bright with excitement, and asked what she was doing for the end of the year. Malia had shrugged, her shoulders lifting casually before saying she didn’t even remember what she used to do for Christmas.

The shocked looks around the table where maybe something she was expecting, since sometimes she thinks they sometimes forgot what she’d been doing for the last eight years, but when they all dropped the conversation and left them sitting in an awkward silence, Malia wasn’t sure what the change in the atmosphere meant.

The whole Christmas thing wasn’t mentioned again for weeks, but with Scott and Stiles, the coyote should have known that meant something was up.

Coming out of history class she finds herself cornered, Scott and Stiles both grinning at her with enough teeth showing that it would have seemed predatory if it wasn’t just plain silly looking.

“You’re coming over for Christmas,” Scott announces, causing her brow to furrow as she keeps her gaze on the alpha.

“Okay,” she shrugs.

“That’s it? Okay?” Stiles’ voice turns her attention to him, and Malia shrugs once more.

“That’s what you want me to say, isn’t it?”

She watches as both boys glance at each other, exchanging looks of surprise before Scott nods, something close to relief flooding his features.

“Okay, so, yeah. Christmas day, come over around noon. And bring your dad, if he wants.”

Her dad’s surprised, but not shocked, when she asks if they have any Christmas plans. Malia can see a small smile tugging at the edge of his lips as Henry Tate looks thoughtful for a few moments before shaking his head.

“No, none that I can think of,” he says, eyes crinkling at the corners as he surveys his daughter in a way that she thinks is almost curiously. “Christmas hasn’t, uh, been too big around the house for the last few years, and I haven’t had time to make any new traditions in a while.”

She can hear the hesitance in his voice, smell the slight scent of discomfort that rolls off him gently, but instead of commenting on any of it, she simply gives him a small smile, tugging at the hem of her sweater.

“Uh, well Scott invited me over to his house on the 25th, and said you’re welcome to come if you want, too. I think his mom is making or ordering some big dinner, because it’s probably going to be everyone. And, well. I was thinking. Maybe, since you don’t have any traditions, we can start making some new ones.”

Her words come out in a rush, blending together as she trips over them somewhere in the middle before she forces them all out. Dark eyes stay adverted from his for a few seconds after, just so Malia doesn’t have to see his reaction right away. She’s not sure whether she’s expecting something good or bad, or if he’ll say no – or actually say yes and tell her they’re going – but in those seconds, neither seems that pleasant. His chuckling breaks the silence, and when she listens to his heartbeat, she can’t find anything to raise any red flags other than the little jump from when she first had told him about the invitation; and that she took to mean was one of surprise.

“Malia,” he chuckles after a moment again, and when she looks up his smile is soft and sweet, “I think that sounds like a great idea. But are you okay with it? We could do something else, if you want. Or just sit around in our pajamas all day and watch movies. That’s what I did for a while for the holidays.”

Her own laugh sounds surprisingly loud to her own ears, and Malia’s not sure if she or her dad is more surprise when she nods. “Yeah, that sounds fun.”

It turns out Christmas at the McCall home is overwhelming. Since they weren’t bringing anything and didn’t really know what was expected of them, the two Tate’s show up later in the evening, listening to the sound of the doorbell ring echoing in the house as they fidget on the front steps. It takes over five minutes before the front door is opened, but once it does, Malia finds herself face to face with a beaming Melissa McCall.

“Malia!” Melissa’s smile widens slightly as she steps aside to let her in, offering the same warm greeting to her dad. “And Henry, I’m glad you two could make it; Scott was beginning to worry, I think. He was worried you’d end up not coming – Scott! Malia’s here!” The older woman paused as she led the way into the kitchen, offering Malia another smile. “Everyone’s there in the living room, you can go meet up with them.”

When she enters the living room, it feels like she’d stepped into a department store during the holiday season. A giant tree stands big and proud in the corner of the room, soft lights twinkling among the green branches with ornaments catching the glow every time that they flickered. Presents are stacked in a way that makes her think the boys had been in charge of it. The whole feel of the room is homey and warm. It reminds her of every time she’s been in the McCall house, but with all the pack members and their parents included, it feels much stronger. There’s the faint sound of Christmas music playing through the radio speakers, but no one seems to be paying much attention as they chat among themselves. Lydia’s sitting with Kira on the loveseat, both of their legs pulled up onto the cushion, chatting with Parrish over something she doesn’t care about enough to listen in on, and Liam and Mason talking with the Sheriff too. Everyone seems content, happy and safe. It’s enough to settle a feeling of warmth into her stomach, and it only grows when Scott bounds over to her from the corner of the room where he was talking with his mom, before his arms wind tight around her in a hug.

“Hey,” he says with eyes and smile bright in a way that’s so Scott, “You’re here! I’m glad you could come.” The alpha pauses, meeting Malia’s eyes before glancing away to look around the room. For a second, she wonders if this is how Christmas always was growing up for him; if his mom has always gone all out to make it a memorable holiday for him. “The rest of us were talking after that day in the when we all were talking about Christmas break plans, and you said you didn’t really like the holiday, so… we’re hoping we can maybe change your mind. Or at least give you a pretty good memory to have, even if you decide you still hate Christmas.”

The smile in his words makes Malia chuckle, blonde hair tumbling out of her braid as she shakes her head gently. When she turns her head to glance at her alpha, she only offers him a smile.

“No, it’s… this is all pretty great. You didn’t have to do this, but,” she pauses for a second, glancing around the room and taking in the faces of her pack members and their parents alike. Christmas may not have been her favorite day, but being around all of these people, she could probably start to make an exception. “Thanks, I mean. I really do appreciate it.”

Scott’s smile widening into a grin only makes things better.

* * *

With her grades and slow learning, despite Lydia’s semi-patient tutoring, Malia never imagined college would be an option for her. It was something of a miracle that she’d made it into her senior year, and then completed it without having been held back and having to repeat it all over again, but college had seemed like such a foreign thing – such a human thing – that she never considered it. Her dad never talked about it much other than when he asked if she had considered going anywhere the day after she’d taken the SAT’s, but after she answered with only a shrug of her shoulders and a slightly helpless and out of place look in her eyes, he’d only smiled and didn’t push the subject again.

“Do you want me to go to college?” She asks him one day over breakfast a few weeks later, feeling slightly scared to know the answer. It’s strange. In the forest she was scared of very few things, and most of the time, Malia felt like she was one of the wood’s many rulers. But this, this is something completely different, completely human, and there’s a huge part of her that feel as though she’d not good enough for college. And that makes her worry. Worry about letting her dad down if he has big dreams for her, worried about what’ll happen to the pack when they’re separated, worried about her.

His smile held no traces of hesitance or disappointment, though, and when he reaches out to pat her hand, gently squeezing it in his before murmuring, “I want you to do what you want,” she can’t help but feel a lot better.

Maybe college doesn’t have to be her plan, like it is Lydia’s or Scott’s or Stiles’, and that’s fine. She’s not sure what that’ll mean when the rest of the pack goes off to college, but for now, it’s enough to settle her nerves over the whole thing.

Besides, there’s a small part of her that’s curious about what she’s scored, but since college isn’t as important to her as it is to the rest, so she doesn’t care about a number that’ll decide what kind of fancy college she’ll go to.

“I think it’s totally fine that you want to explore your options,” Scott says when she confides in her Alpha, turning over one of the many college brochures Lydia handed her as she stares at it before looking up at him. There’s nothing but truth in his eyes, and his smile is as warm as ever. She think it’s his influence most that calms her, because while she knows she’s not disappointing her dad by not planning her future and what school she’ll go to once she graduates high school by the hair on her teeth, it’s also nice to know that her alpha isn’t disappointed in her either.

Scott’s worked hard for the grades he has now, she knows because Stiles told her once, and she’s proud of him. She’ll be even prouder if he gets into the school he mentioned wanting to go to. But that’s all a waiting game, and not one Malia likes much.

* * *

She gets an email, different than the big letters printed on sturdy paper the others get, saying she’s be accepted to City College of San Francisco if she’s still interested in attending their fall course after she graduates. There’s a feeling of warmth that spreads through her when she reads it, and she all but tears down the stairs with her computer clutched tightly in her hands, skidding to a stop in front of her dad when she finds him sitting at the kitchen island, coffee cup raised nearly up to his lips. Without words, her excitement bubbling to the surface, she simply sets down the computer in front of him and watches his eyes dance over the screen as he reads.

It’s a good thing, she thinks. His quietness as he reads, coffee set aside and forgotten. But when he looks back up at her and smiles so wide that it meets his eyes more than she’s ever seen since she turned back human, and gets up to pull her into a tight hug and practically lift her off her feet, Malia can’t help but finally let the laughter she’s been holding just beneath the surface bubble over.

“I’m so proud of you,” her dad says with a warm voice into her hair, causing that constriction of feeling to swell in her chest once more, and her own smile grow to match his own. “I really am.” For a second she sees his eyes flick over to something over her shoulder, and she doesn’t have to glance over to know he’s looking at the family photo of himself, her, and her mother and younger sister, one that was taken before the accident. She doesn’t need to look to know what he’s seeing, but she does anyways. Malia turns in his arms, leaning back slightly against his chest and allowing him to rest his chin on her head. “We all are, Mal. You mom would be thrilled if she were here.”

Like always, the mention of her mother causes her chest to constrict tight with emotion, but for once, ever since finding out it was the Desert Wolf that had caused the wreck and not she on the full moon, the emotion is one of happiness. Not guilt.

“Thanks, dad,” she replies, the word still slightly heavy on her tongue, but she’s rewarded with a gentle kiss to the side of her head.

She tells Stiles about the letter next. Her dad pats her on the back and tells her to go call her boyfriend and tell him the news like he seems to know she’s dying to do, but instead Malia just grins at him and bounds out the door, his voice telling her to be careful on the road reaching her ears just before she slams the car door shut.

He’s sitting on his bed when she bursts into his room after having let herself up the stairs, face brightening when he spots her, and his arms rising just in time to catch her and fall back onto his bed as she throws herself at him.

Malia takes all of two seconds to grin at him before pressing their lips together. The kiss is slower than it would have been months ago, even with the excitement still bubbling inside her, and she sighs against his lips as she slowly takes in the feel of the plump flesh. She knows that with everything that happened since the beginning of their senior year, Stiles still held a lot of guilt and anger that was rare for him; and from what Scott had told her, even more so than from when he’d been possessed by the nogitsune. It had taken a toll on him, just like during his possession, and for a long while, Malia worried about him. Though it was generally typical of him, he always reeked of anxiety, and she knew the separation between him and Scott had been hard during the time of their fighting. Even more, she sometimes thought, because there had been a hard strain on their own relationship, during which she wrestled with the confusion of potential feelings for Theo, and her loyalty to Scott. He hadn’t held that against her, she knew, because the werewolf was her Alpha, and Malia was nothing if not loyal, but she knew it had made things harder between them.

But they’d survived. They always did, after all. It’s what Scott said they did. Survive, keep each other together, and more importantly, keep each other alive.

It hadn’t been easy, but somehow they’d done it.

Now things almost felt like they were getting back to normal. It was strained a lot of the time, and the pack was still trying to figure out how to be a pack again after they’d been broken apart from the inside out, but they were working on that.

And as far as Malia knew, Stiles still had his vision of where he saw them all once they graduated high school, and with time ticking closer and closer down to the end of the year, she knew he was desperately clinging onto the hope that they wouldn’t all just drift from each other like they had during the year (more like been ripped apart, but she pushed those thoughts and memories away whenever they crept into the back of her mind).

Pulling away from him, the coyote settles next to him on her knees instead of sprawled on top of him, watching as his lips formed into a small pout and his eyes blink owlishly up at her.

“What did I do to deserve that?” His words make her smile, and she can’t help but lean down and kiss him once more. Yeah, they were still working on being a better couple, and communicating better (Lydia constantly told her that was important in a relationship), but they were getting there.

“You’ll never guess what came in today,” Malia finally speaks, grinning at him as he just looks at her with a blank look. She thrusts her phone out at him, already opened to her email and watched as his eyes move over the screen, slowly taking in the words.

“You’re going to school in San Francisco?” There’s a small hesitance to his words, and the smell of uncertainty rolls off him in waves as he meets her eyes. The same look of uncertainty is lurking behind the ambers of his irises, like he’s waiting for her to snatch her phone back and tell him it was a joke.

Suddenly, Malia realizes just how much the vision means to Stiles. She knows he’s worried, and he’s explained it to her multiple times, but until now, she never realized just how desperate he is to keep the pack together. For a second, she’s surprised to feel the tugging of hope blossom in her own chest, and allowed herself to grin at him.

“Yeah, I’m going to school in San Francisco.”

His answering smile is enough for Malia to let herself be pulled back down onto the bed as a small laugh bubbled up from her throat before it turns into a breathy sigh as his nose trails over her neck.

Derek’s the next person Malia tells, and while she’s not quite sure when her cousin (cousin, huh. That’s still taking some getting used to) decided to stay in Beacon Hills instead of going back on the road with Braeden, but she’s glad to have him around. The fact that they’re family and that his unbalanced and revenge bent uncle who murdered his older sister was her father was still something that was quick to stall conversations whenever one of them or someone else in the pack (usually Stiles) brought him up, they’re doing pretty okay.

It was still new, having family that’s actually related to her. He lets her vent when she needs to, and in turn, Malia asks about his life growing up. He doesn’t talk much about it, but whenever he decides that she should know some of his deepest memories, she can always see the smile in his eyes, even if it doesn’t really reach his lips. There’s always pain there, too, and it’s something she was all too familiar with. The same emotions shine in her own eyes whenever she thinks about her mom and sister, and she sees it all the time in her dad’s eyes; especially when he looks at her.

But it was good for them, Scott says, to have family around. Even if they started rocky, walking on eggshells around each other after she found out that she was a Hale and not a Tate by blood, eventually they started bonding. She thinks, if she looks back hard enough on it, that the first true moment of it was when he took her out to find Satomi’s pack, though at the time it had been completely for different circumstances.

Now though, they’re much better. Sometimes Malia stays over at the loft a couple nights during the week, and Derek helps her with the homework she still struggles to understand; and when the pack started invading his space and having weekly meetings held there, under Scott’s idea that they needed to be in better communication after Theo had managed to prey on all of their weaknesses and break them apart, she usually stays later and just spends time with him.

So it makes sense to her that he’d be the next one to tell about her acceptance. She just didn’t expect Lydia Martin to be there. Sprawled over his chest with a hand clenched in his shirt as she all but drinks from his lips, Derek’s head leaning down to chase hers when she pulls back.

“Oh.”

To be completely fair, she should have picked up on the fact that he wasn’t alone. And the scent in the air grows so thick that she can nearly taste it, heavy on her tongue. Every sense in her body tells her now that she was invading something that she should have been smart enough to check before she burst through the door, but she hadn’t even considered it. After Derek had stayed in Beacon Hills and Braeden had gone back to what she’d originally been doing, he hadn’t exactly been dating. From what Stiles told her, though, that was typical for him, and when she never saw him even look at a woman for very long, she just began to think he wasn’t interested in anyone. It made sense to her, after having gotten out of some sort of serious relationship (she thinks he and Braeden were considered that, but she never feels like it’s something she should be bothered asking about), and with his track record. She only knows bits and pieces, between having heard the story and meeting the older Argent woman who had threatened the pack before. She understood completely wanting to take a break from the messiness of relationships, even if she herself had only ever been in one.

So yeah, she definitely never considered that Derek would somehow be into Lydia in that way, or that the banshee would return the feelings.

The couple startles apart at the sound of her voice, and she sees realization dawn on both their faces. The fact that Derek hadn’t picked up on her scent or heartbeat either and missed her coming in until she interrupted gives Malia a small moment of feeling smug, but she wasn’t about to tell him that. Instead she just clears her throat and runs a hand through her short hair. When neither of them says anything for a few beats, she just tosses her phone at her cousin, glad to see that his reflexes were at least still intact.

“I got into a school in San Francisco,” she breaks the silence, the smile from earlier tugging at her lips once more and Lydia reaches over to steal the phone from Derek, her eyes scanning the screen. The banshee doesn’t say anything for a few moments, and just hands the phone back to Derek after a few reads. When she looks up at her, though, Malia can see her dimples wanting to appear on her cheeks.

“Wow,” Lydia speaks after a moment, and with that one breath the brunette lets her breath out in a whoosh. It seems stupid, for a werecoyote to be intimidated by a 5'3" banshee, but Lydia’s words have a way to bring even the heaviest and biggest of warriors to their knees. She’d already been on the receiving end of the razor sharp tongue a number of times before they became officially friends, and it’s something she never wants to do again.

So when Lydia says just that one word, Malia can feel the anxiety and tension drain from her body, and forces her gaze up from where her toe’s scuffing against the hardwood in a way that she’s sure Derek will be mad at her for later. Green eyes meet her dark ones and if she’s not wrong, the small hint of a smile on Lydia’s face looks proud. She can’t smell anything coming off her to betray that, and when she lets her eyes slide to Derek, he’s already untangling himself from the petite girl to walk over and wrap an arm around her shoulders.

“Good job, Malia,” is all he says as he presses his lips gently against her temple, and Malia relaxes against him.

* * *

College is so different than high school. She has more freedom, for one thing, and she can pick her classes (her refusal to take any sort of math class during her first semester means that she has to take one later one, to fulfil the credit, which is just stupid. If she needed to take a math class, they should have told her in the first place, so she could badger Lydia into helping her over Skype, at least) and can take late classes which means sleeping in as much as she wants and then dragging herself to class at noon at earliest. It’s weird, not having the pack around, but she slowly gets used to it. It takes time, but Scott makes a point to always get them on a group video chat when they’re all free, and for her first few weeks, after a surprising bout of separation anxiety hits her hard, he calls Malia every day.

It’s soothing, to hear his voice coming over the line, or see his eyes brighten when he laughs. It reminds her that though he’s not sitting right next to her, her Alpha is always around when she needs him.

It makes being apart from everyone a tad easier, but she still finds herself looking forward to the weekly pack video chats, even if they are supposed to be meant to keep everyone up to date on what’s happening in Beacon Hills.

The semester flies by as soon as Malia’s feeling settled in at school, and though she’s finally starting to like going to classes each day, now that she can decide what to take, she’s more than ready to be done. Especially because being done means going back to Beacon Hills for the winter break, seeing everyone in person instead of just through the small screen of her laptop. She’s excited to see her dad, and Scott’s mom and the sheriff. Even Derek she’s more than excited to see. It feels like for months there’s been parts of her missing, and now, knowing that soon she’ll be seeing their faces, she feels complete.

And when she spots Stiles’ jeep in the parking lot outside of her last class of the day, she can’t help but find herself throwing her things to the ground and sprinting across the lawn to meet him there. She tackles him back into the side of the jeep, his laughter filling her ears as she runs her nose down the side of his jaw and his neck, inhaling in his scent. He smells like fresh air and excitement, and his heartbeat thunders in her ears.

“Hey,” he says after a moment, his arms circling her tight as Malia tilts her face up to meet his in a kiss, “Come on, as much fun as this reunion is, we gotta go. I told Scott that we’d pick him up on the way before swinging by for Lydia and Kira, and I’m pretty sure he’s about to crawl out of his skin in excitement.” Malia smiles at him, only half listening to what he’s saying as she climbs into the jeep, her mind focused on the idea of seeing her pack. College might not have been as bad as she had thought it would end up being, but going home to her pack… that’s always so much better than anything else.


End file.
